First challenge: a $487 million budget deficit

Though the fiscal year already had started by the time she assumed office, Preckwinkle was greeted with the news that no work had begun on the budget, and soon after, that the county was facing a $487 million deficit. Preckwinkle was determined not to go back on her campaign pledge to roll back her predecessor’s hated 1 percent sales tax increase, which had given the county the unwanted designation as the jurisdiction with the highest sales tax burden in the nation.

Preckwinkle used one-time measures, like a moratorium on capital expenditures and a 16 percent decrease in overall county expenditures, to close the gap. She immediately began work on the next year’s budget, with a vow to move it to adoption before the Dec. 1 start of the fiscal year and present it in June, the earliest in county history.

To fill a $315 million deficit, Preckwinkle ultimately laid off 800 employees, added parking fees for public buildings and closed tax loopholes. A proposal to charge unincorporated areas for police services, which many saw as a long overdue reform, was set aside in favor of a commission to study the issue after fierce resistance from the affected areas.

She also revised the capital plan to initiate more than $400 million in funding over three years for regional capital projects, including investments in Cook County’s more than 1,500 lane-miles of roads. Three-quarters of the sales tax has been repealed, and it will be eliminated completely in the next budget. Ultimately, the budget was passed by an overwhelming margin before the fiscal year had begun.

“We found her as an individual willing to sit down and listen,” says John Daley, chair of the finance committee. “She has a new agenda for the county and is a very strong leader, but she’s willing to compromise. She’s a new breath of fresh air in county government.”

The Chicago Tribune also was complimentary of the president, citing many of her cost-cutting initiatives. “We like Preckwinkle’s budget primarily because we like its trajectory: less spending, fewer payrollers, and no general tax increase... We hope all taxpayers realize how fortunate they are that Todd Stroger no longer is proposing county budgets,” the newspaper wrote in its editorial page.

As part of the budget process, Preckwinkle held the first-ever public hearing on the preliminary budget and launched an interactive budget website to show residents how tax dollars were being spent, including a tool that allowed users to see how reducing expenditures or increasing revenues would affect the county’s projected budget gap. The website also allowed residents to give feedback to the administration through the “Tell Toni” feature. Her presentations were backed up with research, graphics and charts, which the public and legislators found persuasive.

Under her leadership, the county also has gained support from the county’s civic and business community to bring free assistance to the public sector to assist in reform efforts. Among the $5 million in projects that the cooperation has produced is a comprehensive program to review compensation, purchasing processes and energy use.

“She brought on a sense of urgency as well as hard work,” Msall says about the budget deliberations. “She has won over the city, civic and business leaders. She is willing to talk through issues and explain her positions.”

At the same time, Msall says that hard work remains. “We are not out of the financial woods,” he says. “There are areas that we still need to modernize.”

Public safety and health care next

Two prime functions — public safety and health care — are Preckwinkle’s primary focus of future reform efforts. “There is still a lot of work to do,” she agrees, readily admitting that she plans to run for re-election to a second term.

Preckwinkle has harsh words for the county’s jail system. Currently, 70 percent of its 8,500 to 9,500 daily population consists of inmates awaiting trial for nonviolent offenses, such as drug use, shoplifting and prostitution. She points out that the county is spending almost $150 per day to jail the inmates but does not offer any treatment for substance abuse. “This is terribly wrong, and we have a duty to do something about it,” she says.

As part of the change, the county is moving to increase the number of detainees on electronic monitoring, which costs about one-third as much as keeping a person locked up, through more collaboration between the various departments involved in the public safety system. In addition, the budget includes about $1 million in funds for job training and other programs for the alleged offenders. “Drug treatment, employment, mental health, anything we do is less expensive than to jail them, where there is no success,” she says.

The county’s health care system, where 58 percent of those treated do not have insurance or do not qualify for Medicaid or Medicare, is a second major area where Preckwinkle sees significant room for reform. “People have always operated in their own silos,” she says about county divisions. “We need to try to work together to make sure that the silos work cooperatively. We need to set goals and milestones.”

She would like the federal government to grant the county more dollars immediately, so that it can implement the new federal health care provisions that do not take effect until 2014. “It would help us in the strengthening and sustaining of the public health system,” she says.

In addition to the budgetary changes, Preckwinkle also has instituted management systems to hold accountable all county agencies, bureaus and departments. The Set Targets, Achieve Results (STAR) program establishes performance measures and goals and makes public quarterly reports of the county’s progress toward its objectives. In addition to greater public scrutiny, the STAR program has the added benefit of driving the county toward a similar set of achievements.

Preckwinkle credits a great deal of her initial success to her staff, and Msall notes that she has had success in attracting talented professionals to work in the county. “I’ve been really blessed,” she says. “Good people were not working for the county. They were looking to the city or the state. I was able to get good people to come and work for the county.”

She also makes an effort to open up the government to as many people as possible. “I try to talk to as many people as I can,” she says. “It’s important not to be isolated, to reach out to customers, and I’ve been all over the county the last year and one-half. Some people have said they had not seen the president in the suburbs. I want to be a president for the entire county.”